Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology Unit, German Primate Center, Göttingen, Germany.
BMC Evol Biol. 2013 Oct 26;13:233. doi: 10.1186/1471-2148-13-233.
Species are the fundamental units in evolutionary biology. However, defining them as evolutionary independent lineages requires integration of several independent sources of information in order to develop robust hypotheses for taxonomic classification. Here, we exemplarily propose an integrative framework for species delimitation in the "brown lemur complex" (BLC) of Madagascar, which consists of seven allopatric populations of the genus Eulemur (Primates: Lemuridae), which were sampled extensively across northern, eastern and western Madagascar to collect fecal samples for DNA extraction as well as recordings of vocalizations. Our data base was extended by including museum specimens with reliable identification and locality information for skull shape and pelage color analysis.
Between-group analyses of principal components revealed significant heterogeneity in skull shape, pelage color variation and loud calls across all seven populations. Furthermore, post-hoc statistical tests between pairs of populations revealed considerable discordance among different data sets for different dyads. Despite a high degree of incomplete lineage sorting among nuclear loci, significant exclusive ancestry was found for all populations, except for E. cinereiceps, based on one mitochondrial and three nuclear genetic loci.
Using several independent lines of evidence, our results confirm the species status of the members of the BLC under the general lineage concept of species. More generally, the present analyses demonstrate the importance and value of integrating different kinds of data in delimiting recently evolved radiations.
物种是进化生物学的基本单位。然而，将其定义为进化独立的谱系需要整合几个独立的信息来源，以便为分类学分类制定稳健的假设。在这里，我们以马达加斯加的“棕色狐猴复合体”（BLC）为例，提出了一种综合的物种界定框架，该复合体由七种生活在不同区域的 Eulemur 属（灵长目：狐猴科）组成，这些物种在马达加斯加的北部、东部和西部进行了广泛的采样，以收集粪便样本进行 DNA 提取以及发声记录。我们的数据库通过包括具有可靠鉴定和头骨形状和皮毛颜色分析的局部信息的博物馆标本进行了扩展。
主成分之间的组间分析显示，在所有七个种群中，头骨形状、皮毛颜色变化和响亮的叫声都存在显著的异质性。此外，对种群之间的后验统计检验显示，对于不同的对，不同数据集之间存在相当大的不一致性。尽管核基因座之间存在高度不完全谱系排序，但除了 E. cinereiceps 之外，基于一个线粒体和三个核遗传基因座，所有种群都发现了显著的独特祖先。
使用几种独立的证据，我们的结果证实了 BLC 成员在物种的一般谱系概念下的物种地位。更一般地说，目前的分析表明，在界定最近进化的辐射时，整合不同种类的数据的重要性和价值。
